


it's meeting is a pleasure and it's parting is a grief

by Gwerfel



Series: Tozer and Fitzjames' long cold winter (feat. everybody else) [3]
Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Explicit Sexual Content, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes, Trauma, bisexual tozer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:35:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24488308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gwerfel/pseuds/Gwerfel
Summary: Immediately after Sir John's death, Tozer tries to come to terms with the precarious situation the men now find themselves in. Fitzjames does not help.
Relationships: Commander James Fitzjames/Sgt Solomon Tozer
Series: Tozer and Fitzjames' long cold winter (feat. everybody else) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1704130
Comments: 14
Kudos: 20





	it's meeting is a pleasure and it's parting is a grief

**Author's Note:**

> This is a lot less fun than the previous chapter, sorry about that. 
> 
> A thousand thank yous to Kt_fairy who is endlessly patient and unerringly kind xxx

_They've hired men with the sharp-edged scythes to cut him off at the knee_

_They've rolled him and tied him around the waist, treated him most barbarously_

_They've hired men with the sharp-edged forks to prick him to the heart_

_And the loader has served him worse than that for he's bound him to the cart_

  
  


He cannot properly recall the walk back from the blind - not even dragging Bryant’s body back on the sledge, though he knows that must have been heavy going on the ice.

He doesn’t remember being ordered to Erebus, though there must be a reason he finds himself here. After hours on the ice in the howling blizzard, wrapped up against the blistering cold, the heat below decks is unbearable. Tozer and Heather shed their coats, gloves and cold weather gear dripping melted snow and salty sweat, both panting and red faced. They were given tots of rum when they boarded and Solomon can feel it still burning in his chest, his mouth is bitter with it. Behind them, Healey and Pilkington lower Bryant through the hatch, taking as much care as if he was still alive, not bundled up and tied with string like something brought home from the butcher’s.

How many dead, now? When they lost three men on Beechey it was considered a very black omen - and there were mutterings in some quarters that there were more malevolent forces at work than simple bad luck, but Solomon has never paid heed to the old wives tales sailors wind themselves up over. He is not a superstitious man, and he has lost men before.

There was a week like this in Africa, two years ago. The _Ready_ came up against two slavers only days apart and the second they’d had to board. Private Kempe drowned, stupid kid, and Mellet was run through. He didn't die at once; between them Heather and Tozer carried him back over the gunwales, bleeding and screaming all the way. Solomon can remember the details of it now, but he can't remember how he felt. He must have been afraid - you had to be mad, not to be afraid in all that. The cannons, and the smoke. They lost eight men that day, and all marines.

Not the captain, Tozer thinks. He has never lost a captain.

“Just here, sergeant,” Heather murmurs quietly behind Solomon, nudging him through Erebus’ fo’c’sle. Tozer starts, realising he is holding up the line of men queuing to pass through. 

“Right,” he mutters, nodding, forcing his legs to move.

His boots feel odd on the deck, as if he is still walking on gritty snow, or sand, and the sensation grows stranger still on the ladder as they make their way through the tight stifling passageways and down to the orlop. The Erebites have cleared the washbasins for their use and set out water, and the marines stand aside to give Tozer preference. 

He quickly removes his jacket and rolls up his sleeves to wash, swiping the damp flannel across the back of his neck, inside his shirt and under his arms. The water doesn’t feel cool, or warm, it feels like nothing at all. His hands are strangely large and numb, as if they are not his hands. It must be the abrupt change in temperature making his skin tight, he rubs them together roughly, searching for feeling.

Behind him, as they wait for their turn, he can hear the Erebus marines whispering urgently amongst themselves. 

“What happened, Heather?”

“Did you kill it?”

“Was there more than one?”

“Sergeant Bryant - his head -”

“Not now, wait a moment,” Heather’s low and steady voice commands. 

Tozer cringes with guilt. He has not spoken a word to any of them yet, and dreads the moment he will have to. He splashes his face hurriedly with the stagnant water and feels no relief. Someone has left out their comb and he uses it quickly to tidy his hair, before drying his hands and buttoning his jacket again. 

“Right,” he says, finding his voice more gruff than he expected. The men look at him at once, their eyes wide and black in the gloom of the low beamed orlop. He clears his throat, “wash if you need it, then I want you back in the fo’c’sle in ten minutes.”

He makes to leave, but Pilkington speaks up, “Sergeant - can’t you tell us how it happened to Sir John?”

All of the sensation returns to Tozer’s extremities at once, the hot blood in his fingertips and the sickly cold of the water he washed with. The lanterns seem to swing, and the bulkhead presses in - the grinding echo of the ice against the hull which is now a constant accompaniment to their daily lives suddenly becomes intolerable.

Once again, Heather steps into the breach, “It came from behind us,” he says, his usually merry voice dark and sober. “The thing took Sergeant Bryant first - it killed him quick, he’d no time to aim his rifle. It knew what it was doing - went for Sir John next and dragged him off so fast.”

“Did you fire on it, Sergeant Tozer?” Healey asks, his grey eyes grave and heavy. 

“Aye,” Tozer nods, “aye, but it was quick.”

“Did you see it? The bear?”

Bile rises suddenly in Solomon’s hot throat and he fights to keep it down. It wasn’t a bear. It wasn’t a bear. He doesn’t know what it was. 

“Snow was falling too thick,” he replies. 

Heather nods, and the other marines share a grim look between themselves. The ice groans, and Tozer grits his teeth, straightens his back and sets his jaw, “ten minutes, you hear?”

He leaves them to it, and is grateful to turn his back as he makes towards the ladder up. Heather’s reassuring steps follow him, solid on the deck. As Solomon reaches for the first rung, the private lays a hand on his shoulder and grips him, just once. For a moment Tozer thinks Heather might say something - tell him to pull himself together, or to to take heart, but he doesn’t; he leaves it at that. 

They surface in the fo’c’sle which is abuzz with fearful murmuring. The men have been given their grog, and there is none of the usual evening cheer. Sailors sit with heads bowed, staring into space or slouched despondently. Those speaking amongst their messmates do so quietly, and Solomon becomes more aware than ever of the great weight which now bears down on him, as fifty or more sets of eyes swivel in his direction and the mumbling increases. Something prickles in the back of his skull - an instinctive awareness of the unpredictable nature of a crew ill at ease. None of Erebus' officers are anywhere to be seen, all busy behind the wardroom line, and Tozer is the most senior man present. 

_Keep an eye on it_ , Solomon thinks. Keep things calm; that is his only task for now. And when Crozier arrives, everything will become clearer. There will be a plan. 

Even if not for the heavy pall of grief which hangs over the entire company, it feels strange finding himself in Erebus when he is so familiar with Terror. The ships are two sisters with distinct characters; outwardly similar but not enough alike where it counts. The lamplight doesn't strike the wooden bulkhead in quite the same way, the lingering reek of Mr Wall’s cooking has a queer undernote which Solomon has never noticed in Diggle’s galley. 

They are quickly joined by the rest of the marines, who still have a thousand questions to ask. By now Solomon has settled on his answers. 

“Sergeant Bryant was out there at the blind to protect the crew - he died doing his duty, that’s all there is to it.” Tozer says, firmly. 

“What will happen now, Sergeant?” Pilkington finally asks, his eyes wide and round as any boy who has just seen his first battle.

“We ought to have a coffin made,” Healey says, “ought to be us that makes it. Will there be a service, Sergeant Tozer?”

“Aye, and who’s to give it without Sir John?” Asks Hopcraft, frowning.

“Should bury him, like we did Braine. Only right.”

“Will you speak to the captain, Sergeant?” Healey turns to him. Tozer realises he has no idea which captain the private is referring to.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he nods. 

“And until then?”

“You can keep him in your prayers. Bryant and Sir John both.” He says this with all the conviction he can muster, and it seems to settle things for now. That is, until Pilkington pipes up next,

“Will Mr Goodsir want to see to him? Like he did Young, and the Hartnell boy?” 

Tozer hasn’t the first idea how to answer that, or even if he ought to, so perhaps John Morfin being moved to sing is a kind of divine intervention. A respectful hush falls over the deck and Solomon wonders if he is not the only man grateful for some relief from their own troubled thoughts. 

He stands back and folds his arms across his chest, feeling his heart pounding beneath his jacket, and tries to listen to the mournful song, but though he knows the tune he cannot hear a word. The hail falling hard against the deck above, and the ice scraping away below seem to blot out everything else, and he tries to heave his mind back to the blind, to try to make sense of it. Crozier will ask him to report on it, surely. Goodsir has been in the great cabin already, perhaps he has given a thorough account. 

It was as Heather said - quick. All had been well, they were settling in for a long watch, the trap baited, and then, only whiteness. The blind had been ripped back so fast it was like being jolted awake from some sluggish dream; his hat went flying, the wind and the cold crashed against his face, there was snow in his eyes and shouting. Bryant’s body landing hard in the snow before them - and then his head, or part of it; startled eyes wide and blue as the ice. With shame Tozer realises he did not even think of Sir John, in that moment he thought of nothing but the horror of those two dull thuds. 

He had fired, he remembered that. All of them had aimed and discharged and hit nothing; whatever the beast was, it seemed to move through the snow like smoke.

All of the men of Erebus are singing now, their voices fill the deck. Tozer tries to remember whether Bryant ever mentioned having a wife, or a family. Paterson will know. Captain Crozier arrives, but does not interrupt them, and proceeds directly to the great cabin without a word.

When the song comes to its end there is a Sunday service atmosphere, and though the grief lies thicker upon every man’s head it is also shared amongst them. It is June, they expect to complete the passage in some months, there is talk of it every day. It was supposed to be Sir John’s victory - without him, there hardly seems to be any glory left in it. 

The command meeting is a brief one, Mr Blanky appears first, and shortly afterwards Crozier and Little. Crozier hasn’t a word for the men, as Solomon knows Sir John might have spared a moment in passing. Having served under Crozier for two years now, Tozer is unsure whether Terror’s captain is simply a man of few words, or if he shoulders that hereditary contempt all sailors have for Royal Marines, for he only ever addresses Tozer when protocol or circumstances demand it. 

The death of the expedition’s senior officer and Erebus’s marine sergeant are apparently not the right circumstances either. 

Lieutenant Le Vesconte is the last to emerge from the cabin. Tozer spies him across the deck, his face as pale as his silver hair, graver than Solomon has ever seen him. The lieutenant moves quickly and quietly through the men, some of whom have begun to weep. He pats an AB on the shoulder, and offers another a tight-lipped smile, but his expression remains one of great suffering. 

“Sergeant Tozer,” the officer says when he reaches the marines, “you are requested in the great cabin.”

“Aye, sir,”

* * *

He didn’t expect to find himself alone with Captain Fitzjames. They have not been alone in a room - they have barely been anywhere near each other - since Beechey Island, over a year ago. The sound of chatter is muffled now that he is so removed from the rest of the crew, and the silent cabin is the most peace Tozer has known in hours. 

The light inside is thin and grey, the dark panelled walls almost black against the pale sun pouring in through the wide windows. There are shelves and shelves of books, and paintings on the walls, and maps on the great dark desk, but barely any of it seems to register with Tozer, the eerie change in atmosphere is too striking. 

Fitzjames steps quickly around the desk, as if to greet him, but then stops short. He tucks his hands behind his back, “Sergeant,” he says, “are you well?”

“Quite well, sir.” Solomon isn’t sure what he means, but he knows it is the only answer appropriate to give. He doesn’t fully step into the room, in case the meeting is a short one - the captain must have much to be about.

“Good,” Fitzjames nods, distractedly, “that is good.” 

He has been crying, Tozer can hear the tight heat in his throat as he speaks, the same shock which Solomon feels pressing in is plainly visible in the feverish flush of the commander’s face.

“I am ever so sorry about Sir John, Commander - _Captain_ ,” Solomon says, all in a rush, “the creature - it took us by surprise, it seemed to come from above…” he blinks hard a few times, his insides turning to ice at the vivid memory of Bryant being wrenched upwards. “I have never seen anything like it, sir.”

“I am sure you did as much as you could, Sergeant.”

Perhaps Fitzjames isn’t sure what he means, either. His shoulders lower, he leans back against the desk, hands gripping the edge of the polished mahogany top. He looks away, at the squat little stove to his left, where orange flames flicker quietly over the coal.

"Captain Crozier is sending a sledge party south,” he says, after a moment, his voice coming clearer, “to the Hudson Bay Company’s outpost on Great Slave Lake. Lieutenant Fairholme will be leaving tomorrow - he needs two marines. Are there two men you could put forward?"

"Aye sir,” Tozer says at once, “Hedges would be up to it. Healey too."

"Very good," Fitzjames looks down, and silence cuts between them once more.

“Captain,” Tozer shifts uneasily. He has not been dismissed, but that can’t be all, and he is keen to remember his men. “About Sergeant Bryant, sir. He’ll need burying. The marines want to build the coffin, and to have words said over him.”

“Yes, of course,” Fitzjames nods, frowning, "we will need some time to make the right preparations… but first Sir John must be…"

"Aye, sir."

The captain seems to rally, clearing his throat. He uncreases his brow and straightens. “You’ll see that Corporal Paterson has all that he needs?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good,” he nods again, his knuckles tightening on the desk. 

“...will that be all, sir?”

“What was that?”

“Do you need anything else from me, captain?” He would hate to leave the man like this.

The captain looks at him a long while, then shakes his head, “no, I… no.”

“I could fetch Doctor Stanley, or… or anyone you wanted, sir.”

“I am not unwell.”

“No, I know that.” Tozer licks his lips, burnt raw from the cold, and takes a friendly step forward, as if to confide something private, “still, it does no good to be alone, eh? What if I fetched Lieutenant Le Vesconte, sir?”

The captain looks up at him again, his eyes sharper. "No," he says, "no need."

"Very well, sir."

"You needn’t be concerned. I will see that proper arrangements are made for Sergeant Bryant."

"Thank you, sir. My men will do the bulk of it, I've no doubt, we look after our own."

Fitzjames seems to appreciate this; a light of understanding flickers in his face. He breathes in deeply, his shoulders rising, and runs his fingers through his hair, "it seems a great responsibility has fallen upon us both, Sergeant."

Tozer doesn't reply, aware that the captain's tone has shifted somewhat. He watches him with care, trying to judge his mood. 

"Do you feel up to the challenge?"

"Of course, sir," Tozer answers immediately with a frown, alarmed there is even a question.

The captain blinks at him, his eyes still overbright, and Solomon realises that it is not his own adequacy which is being examined. He relaxes a little and softens his voice, "but then I find myself responsible for five more men, and not sixty."

"I am sure you will do a fine job, Sergeant Tozer," Fitzjames replies despondently. 

"Aye, and so will you, sir." Solomon insists. 

The captain nods, but he still looks thoroughly wretched. There is such a stifled grief apparent in every line of his pinched face that it becomes nearly impossible for Solomon to separate his captain from the inscrutable young officer he met those years ago in Portsmouth dockyard. Tozer should like to take him by the shoulders and meet his eyes, to somehow shore him up. 

He clears his throat, "today is a black day, captain." He is aware that they are now walking the thin line between their ranks and their past intimacy. It’s a knife’s edge, and if they stumble then he is not sure where they will land. "But you are as fit for command as any man I ever knew. You will be a fine captain."

He must have said this with enough confidence to affect Fitzjames, who does meet his eye now. "You, of all people would say that?"

Tozer frowns, because why should he not say so? 

"Aye, sir, for I know you are a good man,” he confirms, and then, remembering something which charmed him long ago, he adds, “a singular man.” 

A curious expression passes over Fitzjames’ face and for a moment Solomon fears he has overstepped. The captain’s dark eyes flick towards the closed door, and then back at Solomon. He licks his lips and straightens, raising his chin.

"Would you…” he tilts his head, seeming to consider something. His red-rimmed eyes take on a new kind of clarity as they rake over Solomon’s uniform, down to his boots and up to his stiff collar, “would you come to me, sergeant?"

Tozer hasn’t the reserves to be alarmed by the suggestion; not while his blood is still simmering with panic leftover from the blind. Perhaps the captain has the same swell of anxious energy.

He doesn’t have a reason to refuse, and crosses the floor as soon as he is asked. Fitzjames reaches for him, as he never did before, his long fingers smoothing and curling lightly over Solomon’s jacket. Tozer holds him at the waist as their bodies press close against each other. Solomon searches for Fitzjames' mouth, hoping that the familiar warmth of him will blot out the sound of the hailstones clattering viciously against the frozen window.

For Tozer, kisses have always been a sweet prelude; he savours the warm dark promise of his lover's mouth, he delights in every exploratory caress, relishing the warm building of desire. It has always been a very simple pleasure.

But he doesn't think he has ever kissed anybody like this, nor been kissed in such a way. There’s a dire sort of desperation in it which Tozer isn’t used to, they paw at each other wildly, as if reaching for something they know is already lost. The desire is there, yet it has new and fearsome plains to it; shadows and empty spaces. Fitzjames grabs at him; he has him at the neck and shoulder, pressing in with his hips and the hot heels of his hands. Solomon begins to feel that no matter how slanted things are becoming, he needs this just as much as the captain does; the captain whose body feels so steady against his, so real and so sound that Solomon grips him back, pushing him against the edge of the desk. 

Christ, it has been so long since he's held another person close; he could grow giddy on the sensation, as if it is the greatest luxury in the world.

His energies are so focused that he does not notice Fitzjames’ hands wandering, nor even that Fitzjames has unbuttoned his trousers until the captain makes a noise of impatience, grasping Solomon’s wrist and thrusting his hand against his stiff prick. Tozer rubs at him obediently, feeling stupid and shaken. He pulls away to catch his breath, and finds his cheeks wet, Fitzjames’ eyes are gleaming once more. 

"I shouldn't,” Tozer shakes his head and tries to withdraw his hand, “I shouldn't..."

"No," Fitzjames presses his own palm over Solomon’s, holding him there, "no, do - please." He reaches for Solomon’s breeches, “here, I shall return the favour.” 

“Are you sure--?”

“Sergeant,” the captain’s voice turns cold as he takes Solomon’s yard roughly in his hand, “do not ask again.”

Tozer knows when he is being given an order, no matter how quietly, and he kisses the captain again, wading back into the strange uncharted territory of this new and uncanny appetite. Nothing is as it was; it is as if they have never coupled before. They twist their rough hands without courtesy or patience, their knuckles knock against each other in uneven haste, and Fitzjames ruts urgently against Solomon’s thigh to hurry him along. 

Tozer barely feels it when he spends, only the captain’s rigid fingers and an uneasy numb prickling somewhere in his middle. Fitzjames releases him almost at once to pursue his own end, breaking their kiss and bowing his head against Solomon’s chest, eyes squeezed shut. Tozer strokes him all the faster, feeling sour and sore and unsatiated.

“Ah!” Fitzjames chokes, and that is that, Tozer lets him go and steps away, unable to look him in the eye. 

They wipe themselves and fasten their trousers in shameful silence. Tozer gazes out of the window at the still falling snow. During the first year of the expedition he could dispel the darkest moments by summoning up a memory of England, replacing the unending winter with a picture of home. He thinks he will forget the colour green, if they are iced in much longer. He will forget grass hillsides, and fresh apples, and golden skies on summer evenings. He doesn’t even dream of them any more, his nights are as bare as his days more often than not. 

He wonders about Fitzjames’ happiest memories; what kind of childhood freedoms he must hark back to for comfort while they are lodged in this bleak place. He'd have liked to have to asked him, once, but Solomon is not sure he'd understand it, and the captain doesn’t strike him as a man given to nostalgia. It is no matter; likely Fitzjames wouldn't comprehend Solomon’s past either. 

Fitzjames has remembered his posture, and has returned to stand behind the desk. He appears to be inspecting a map smoothed out on the surface, but Solomon is unconvinced. Having now seen to themselves, they must finally acknowledge each other, and Tozer is the first to break the dead air between them. 

“I’m not sure if that was the right thing” he says sheepishly, awash with the clarity that comes after spending. “Might only muddle things, carrying on like that.”

“It was nothing,” Fitzjames shakes his head, half turning away to button himself.

Solomon cannot help feeling stung, and mutters, “as you please, sir.”

The captain’s head snaps up, he looks at Tozer directly. He is still pinched with sickly grief, but it does not soften his newly imperious gaze. 

“Things are dreadfully complicated. They will be for some time now, I imagine,” he says, the timbre of his voice as steady and firm as when he addresses the men.

Tozer nods, finding himself unable to respond.

“ _You_ have never been complicated, Sergeant,” Fitzjames continues, “I am grateful for it. Do not change that now.”

“No, sir.” Solomon feels he has been reprimanded for something. The captain is being as clear as he ever is about his wants, and Tozer hopes he has always proved himself attentive in that regard.

He has never pretended to know the man’s soul; he has always enjoyed the mystery of him. But like many things which once brought Tozer joy, the tender understanding they may once have shared is now behind him; irretrievable. The line is drawn now; this ugly interlude was a parting of the ways, and Solomon has never regretted anything so bitterly. 

They are not the same as they were four years ago, the balance weighs against Solomon in every aspect - but hasn't it always? No two men who ever stood in a room together saw each other as equals, and that is just the simple truth of the world.

“If that is all, sir, I’ll return to Terror.”

“Very good, Sergeant.”

* * *

The hail has softened to light snow by the time he and Heather are back in their cold weather gear and trudging across the treacherous sea ice, their path meandering to avoid the great frozen ridges which have reared up like minor mountains blocking and frustrating their passage to Terror. As their journey is interrupted again and again, they must rely on glimpses of the fearsome black hull of their ship through the blue-white corridors of ice in order to find their way, raising their gloved hands to shield their eyes from the driving snow.

The walk is hard, but bracing, Tozer revels in the burning in his muscles, the sobering shock of the frigid wind. Neither of them say a word, they haven’t the energy to waste on talk, and Solomon is thankful for the opportunity to clear his head of anything but reaching his destination. 

Before leaving he had words with Corporal Paterson and Private Hedges, and the marines stitched Bryant into his hammock. Goodsir had bound up his head, hiding the horror of it, but it still rolled inside the shroud when they lifted him and bore him down into the hold. He thinks Heather must be right, that Bryant died quickly. Tozer isn’t sure what he saw this afternoon, but he knows the beast is enormous; bigger than any of them imagined, except perhaps Bryant himself, who had faced it before.

There is no guarantee that the creature is finished with them yet. As he and Heather trudge across the ice they are both alert, rifles in hand, they jerk their necks at the slightest sound carried by the wind. Even if they could hear it coming, Tozer isn’t sure it will make a difference. It tore Sir John and Bryant apart like rag dolls.

It could be anywhere - at the blind there had been no sign of it at all, not a sound, not the slightest movement. A vision of the white bear Tozer shot last Christmas returns to him - he’d taken it down with barely any effort; it hadn’t seen him, he hadn’t allowed it even a second to react. If the thing that got Sir John is stalking him now, perhaps he will never know it.

It is almost an hour before they are in sight of the ramp, and can hear the ABs on watch calling out to them. Captain Crozier and Lieutenant Little returned some time ago, and news of Sir John and Sergeant Bryant will have arrived ahead of them, but Tozer realises with a sickening tug that the sailors will have saved up all of their questions for him and Heather, and the moment they are in the ship he will be hounded for answers.

They stop for a breather at the foot of the ramp. The snow has finally stopped, the air is crisp and clear, the sky above them brilliant white. Tozer would give anything to smoke, but his tobacco is tucked away in his trunk. 

“All right, Sergeant?” Heather asks him carefully.

Tozer nods at once, his neck stiff from the biting cold. 

He looks back across the ice, to where the fire hole is, barely distinguishable through the fresh blanket of snow. There was blood all over, only a few hours ago; a wide scarlet splatter. He turns back to the ship, into the wind. It catches him in the face, razor sharp in his eyes and he blinks hard, sure for a moment he can see Bryant's head, jaw wrenched loose and glassy eyes staring. He rubs at his face and his stomach drops, his head spinning.

“We can’t beat it.”

"Steady, lad, steady," Heather grips the back of Tozer's neck with his gloved hand.

"The way it just snatched him up - it took the whole blind with it."

"Aye," Heather pulls Tozer quickly to him in a hard embrace, patting his back, as their chests bump together. It's a clumsy, brief action, something they have never done before, but it jars Tozer enough to regain his grip on himself. 

“You did well with the lads on Erebus,” Heather comments. “You will go on doing well with them. You’re a fine sergeant.”

“Bryant was a fine sergeant. Sir John was a fine captain. There was nothing could be done to save either of them. Nothing. You saw it, we both fired - it made no odds to that devil.”

“I know,” Heather glances away, a shred of feeling in his own grey eyes. “That was a bad end for them both. Feel sorry over it, but don’t blame yourself.” Heather shakes his head, “duty first, worries later. We do what we can, and keep our chins up. Don’t you turn all dour scouse on me.” 

“How do I put it to the men?” Tozer asks, desperately, feeling the darkness beginning to press in on him, harder than it has before. 

“Tell ‘em the truth. Tell ‘em it’s a rough one. We are Royal Marines - we step up and we face it because that’s what we came here to do. Might be slavers, might be bears.”

“That thing can’t be a bear.” Tozer shudders.

“Doesn’t matter what it is. We protect the men from it. That’s the job.”

“You’re right.”

“Aye, I am a very wise old man,” Heather’s eyes have regained some of their twinkle. 

“Come on, then,” Solomon jerks his head at the ramp, “let’s have it.”

Heather and Tozer climb the ramp steadily, and as they ascend Tozer’s mind clears. With Heather steady at his back he grows surer with every step that things will improve once they are aboard. At least they have seen the beast now; every time you meet the enemy you learn a little more. 

There will be work to do, and preparations to make, and actions to regret tomorrow, but today is a black day, and for now that is all it can be.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Song at the beginning is John Barleycorn. 
> 
> No, the next chapter will not be more cheerful, but it will be Carnivale, and someone's getting CAULKED.


End file.
